


From Galley to Government

by mrstater



Category: Chalion Saga - Lois McMaster Bujold
Genre: Flogging, Gen, Gods, Religions, Religious Themes & References, Severe Beating, Slavery, Torture, Whipping
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-05-11
Updated: 2011-05-11
Packaged: 2017-10-19 06:47:30
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,428
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/198090
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mrstater/pseuds/mrstater
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Eight drabbles on Cazaril's journey.</p>
            </blockquote>





	From Galley to Government

**Author's Note:**

> A collection of drabbles written for the April Flowers prompts at the Chalion-Ibra LJ community.

**I.**

For seven days, Cazaril has been chained to this bench. Seven days, and even when not rowing, he remains chained here.

He remembers pacing--six strides up, six strides down again, four strides across, four strides back again--in his cell in Visping before he was sold. He wonders if he could walk now, after seven days chained to this bench, if he will ever be able to walk again, when he is freed from the galley.

 _If_ he is freed. In seven days, he's become less certain he knows the word _when_.

He would give anything to be back in his prison in Visping, where he could pace. If only he'd realized then how free he'd been.

There was a window there, overlooking the sea. Caz had avoided looking out it as much as possible, unable to bear the sight of the grey sea that isolated him as effectively as the stone walls and iron bars. If only he could look out at the sea now, and know there is more of the world than this cramped, dark one to which he is confined, and that, though far from home, not getting farther from it with every pull of his oar.

But there is no other view than the scarred backs of the slaves chained to the bench in front of his, and Cazaril begins to fear that in seven more days, he will forget he ever knew any other prison than this bench to which he is chained.

 

 

 **II.**

He dreams of sunlight, down in the dark of the galley, dreams of it so long that he's begun to wonder whether it was just a dream to begin with. Has he ever really beheld the joyous brilliance of a sunny day? Stepped out into the sunlight and sneezed, once, twice, occasionally even thrice? Surely he must have done--he never could have dreamed such detail.

It is nothing like a dream when they drag him up from the galley. He does sneeze--and snivels and sobs--as he raises manacled hands to block out the light that blazes and blinds eyes too long accustomed to the dim, but then his arms are lashed behind him to the mast and he has nothing but the dry, paper-thin lids of his eyes to protect from the terrible brilliance of the day.

High above the deck of the ship, he dreams of dark.

 

 **III.**

Cazaril is a devout man, not enough to be an acolyte or a dedicat and certainly not a divine, but enough to scorn those foxhole Quintarians who never speak to the gods except in times of trouble. And certainly he is devout enough to grow complacent, not realizing, until he finally tastes the first real trouble of his life, that he's every bit as much of the foxhole believer as any man.

Chained to an oar and stripped of everything but a soiled rag to cover his privates, he murmurs a prayer to the Gods: _When I dedicated my life to Your service, I didn't realize that meant I'd have to give you everything_ but _my life._

 _What I said about You not taking my life,_ he addresses them again, when he's lost even the rag and gawks down from the mast at the archers' jeering faces. _It seems I was wrong. Please, don't let this be the last thing I see._

He opens his eyes to the concerned face of an acolyte in the Mother's Hospital. "Thank You for letting me live," he prays, and then falls to weeping. _I think._

What does he have left to live _for_?

 

 **IV.**

At first Cazaril enjoys the rain when it begins to gently fall, languid drips sliding down his face as if the clouds have simply melted in the sky. It's been so long since he felt the rain upon him; confined to the galley, he'd experienced storms only as the terrifying swells that tossed the hulk about like a toy boat against their futile rowing.

But soon the novelty wears off, as it soaks his clothes through and weights them down, sucking his weary feet down into the mire that was the road, lashing at his cheeks like the oarmaster's whip.

 

 

 **V.**

In a copse some way off the road, Cazaril half-sits, half-collapses onto the fresh smelling, soft lichen covered ground. He takes a moment to catch his breath, moving not a limb as he allows the restful stillness to seep into muscles that burn and joints that ache from his weeks-long journey.

When even his eyelids begin to sag with the blessedly relaxed state, a movement in the thicket catches his attention. His eyes pop wide open, he darts as straight upright as if sitting in a high-backed chair.

 _There_ , on a branch about eight feet up, a flutter of red. Caz lets out the breath he was holding, shaking his head at his paranoia, and leans back on his elbows to watch the cardinal hop about the branch, starting construction on his nest.

If only _he_ could build a home of twigs and bits of shiny things found discarded on the ground, Caz wouldn't have to continue his exhausting trek to Valenda. Of course, it rather wearies him just to watch the bird fly back and forth to fetch construction materials, and unlike Ser dy Cardinal, whose dowdy little wife Caz has just spotted rooting for supper among last autumn's fallen leaves , he'd have no one to share a snug little nest or a dinner of juicy worms with, nor any hope of finding even a plain, mousy wife, thanks to his decided lack of fetching red plumage and shiny bits.

Metaphorically speaking. Which means he's probably at the cusp of composing very bad poetry about his sorry lot, when he ought to be grateful just to be alive and free.

So he curls up on the lichen and is lulled to sleep by the flutter of wings.

He dreams he flies the rest of the way to Valenda.

 

 

 **VI.**

Before he must stand, Cazaril reaches for his goblet to take a fortifying drink of wine, but Betriz catches his hand, squeezing it, and there isn't time for the drink. As a man in a dream, he watches the Royina announce to her court that she appoints him Chancellor.

 _Him._

He, himself, Caz.

How can a man be lifted from galley slave to Lord of the land?

The chain of office round his neck, however, is undeniably real, heavy as the shackles of slavery, throwing him off-balance.

 _At last_ , the time comes for that drink.

While the court toasts Lupe dy Cazaril the Chancellor of Chalion-Ibra, Caz drinks in remembrance of the Lady of Spring.

And her yoke seems easy.

 

 

 **VII.**

After Iselle has placed the chain of office around his neck, Cazaril lifts his head and thanks her.

"For giving you a great deal more work and responsibility than any man should bear?" replies the Royina, eyes twinkling. She takes the new Chancellor's disfigured hand in hers and coaxes him to his feet. "I only wish I could do more to thank you for saving my kingdom and my family."

"You did give me a bride," says Cazaril, and behind him comes the sound of someone clearing her throat.

Iselle casts a look of merriment and mischief at the throat-clearer behind, then affects authority. "Might I remind you, Lord dy Cazaril, that it is you whom I have given in marriage."

"And that, Your Highness," says Caz, catching Betriz's hand and pulling her alongside him, "proves that you are no hard mistress."

"Hush!" whispers Iselle. "You will ruin my reputation!"

 

 

 **VIII.**

The slightly sweet, piney tang of sanded wood fills his nostrils as he descends into the hold once dominated by the odors of human misery. Once his eyes adjust to the poor light, he notes the incongruity of the light new wood of the rowing benches against the weathered timbers that form the belly of the ship. He bends for closer inspection, half-expecting to see the sepia and rust-colored stains of old blood and filth, the iron shackle cuffs bolted to floorboards and oars, but all is spotless, giving no indication that his forebear might once have languished here, enslaved.

"I trust you find all in keeping with the new treaties, Lord dy Cazaril?" asks the Roknari Prince. "You will report to your Roya that the blight of slavery has been purged from my country?"

Dy Cazaril nods. If only the blight could be, so easily, removed from family memory.


End file.
